Double Blind
by blackmare
Summary: Never tell the subject of your experiment what you're doing. It'll only mess up your results.
1. Chapter 1

_**SPOILERS **for Season 5. If you're avoiding those, read no further._

_**Disclaimer:** These characters belong to David Shore, FOX, and many others who aren't me. I'm making no money on them and will put them back when I'm done._

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He's Wilson, sitting here in his office, Busy with Important Stuff. There are whole stacks of rabid paperwork to be tamed; long lines of needy cancer-riddled souls are lining up outside that staid wooden door -- and right now, he's Wilson.

This isn't something House has ever imagined before, and momentarily it distracts him: there's a bizarre sense of _power_ about being Wilson, a thing House has always suspected but never _felt_ until now.

The power makes him feel free to play a little, to glance at his Hitchcock posters and imagine himself looking through the _Rear Window_, whilst doing that careful balancing act in his chair. He's Wilson right now, and this is how Wilson always does it: turn to the side, face outward, rock back, _oh shit_ --

It's sort of an interesting view from down here. Someone (cancer kiddie?) has stuck a gob of pink gum beneath the edge of Wilson's desk.

He's not Wilson anymore; his leg, displeased with the sudden jarring as he hit the floor, has reminded him of that. House suspected it would, but he'd needed a trial run for his experiment.

If he could really be Wilson, even for a minute, he could predict what Wilson will do about this. He'd know if Wilson has truly forgiven him or is pretending things are better when they're not. Asking is no good, because Wilson doesn't tell the truth about himself unless he's caught off guard or too furious to lie, and now doesn't feel like a good time to pick a fight.

Scientific methods are safer. Introduce a stimulus, monitor the response, try not to get bitten in the process. Yeah. He'll need to do something about that, something to make sure Wilson -- who can be breathtakingly dense -- does not mistake the meaning of the prank.

House's stomach rumbles, and he has an idea.

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That House would be insecure for a while -- way more insecure than usual, which is really a frightening thought -- was a given.

The extent of the man's desperation is only now truly evident. It's sitting there on a plate, in the form of a custard-filled pastry, a little sugar-glazed _I love you_ with a carton of nice fresh_ please don't kill me_. Put it in the context of the wheel stolen from his chair, and Wilson can translate it easily enough:_ I've missed you; are you really still my friend? Come play with me_.

"It's my way of saying 'welcome back'," says House, as if he's afraid that isn't obvious enough.

Wilson has a few minutes, so he stays on the floor, finishing the doughnut while he thinks about this. It's not a question of _whether_ to retaliate. He has to, or House will go insane with worry and take everyone else on the trip to the Loony Bin with him. The only question is how to go about it. House will be on guard against a physical gag, expecting tit for tat. _Weird expression. Tit. Tits, perhaps. And long blonde hair and a kid and_ -- oh, now _there's_ something House will fall for. It's almost too cruel.

God, he wishes Amber could be here to see this.


	2. Chapter 2

"Is she an actress?" House asks, and for a moment Wilson's sure he's already been busted. That's _precisely_ what she is.

Somehow, he manages to disguise his shock as mere confusion, and House buys it. He must really be off his game. _Good_.

The rest of the lies flow easily, each with more confidence than the last. House's languid pose -- and that's all it's ever been, a pose -- stiffens until he's propped against the sofa like a steel beam. _Hook, line, and sinker_. He's so far gone he doesn't even make a joke about Debbie doing Dallas.

Wilson is prepared for House to start yelling, _You're an idiot; she's obviously mining you for all the gold you're worth; why don't you just empty your bank account, scatter the money in the street and be done with it? You really believe that law school crap?!!?_

"If you're happy," House says, and it sounds like he's gagging on the words, "I'm --"

Gone, is what he is, apparently preferring to remove himself rather than say what he's dying to say.

In all the time they've been friends, Wilson can't ever remember House trying this hard to be ... not right, but _good_. Wilson considers having mercy, but this? This is new behavior, and he'd like to study it, form a solid hypothesis, while he can.

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"Debbie's meeting me for lunch," he says, giving it that best shy, blinking, glancing-at-the-floor treatment. "Don't bother following me. You've got a case."

"And you're --" House stops himself with what looks like a supreme effort of will and a hard bite to his lower lip. "_Happy_. And ... paying, I have no doubt."

"Why don't I just give you ten dollars and we can pretend you stole my sandwich?" He gets out his wallet, removes two fives. "It might help you feel less neglected."

"Something's _changed_," House says, staring at the money as if Wilson were trying to hand him a bit of week-old roadkill.

"Nothing's changed."

"And that's why you won't tell me where you were on Monday morning?" House turns and leaves him standing there in the hall, hand outstretched, forlorn five-dollar bills flapping in the breeze.

_Incredible. House, refusing money_. Wilson shakes his head. That's serious. The emotions are getting in House's way, or he'd have figured out the ruse long before now. How far can Wilson push this before House either catches on or loses control and tells him he's a complete imbecile?

The Debbie Scenario should have triggered an instant explosion, which House had somehow managed to hold back. It's not easy to think of anything that'll press House's buttons any harder than that. An illness might do it, especially if it were something ridiculous and self-inflicted, but faking a medical condition? With _House?_ Bad idea on a number of levels, not the least of which is House's tendency to investigate symptoms by jabbing them with large needles.

Speaking of which ... he has clinic duty after lunch, and there's always the sharps bin ...

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Half an hour after Wilson leaves for lunch, House picks up the phone and calls his pet P.I. The sooner he knows what's happening, the sooner he can concentrate on his actual _job_. Saving lives and all that.

"So where'd our wannabe Richard Gere take his new Pretty Woman?"

"He met her at La Montaigne," Lucas says, and oh God, it's as bad as House thought.

La Montaigne is where Wilson used to take Julie.

House doesn't realize he's been silent a while until Lucas blurts out, "You don't want to know anything else?"

"Nothing's changed," House says, and hangs up on him.

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Wilson starts near the bottom of the bag. A little trash goes in, and then the first syringe. A little more, and then another one, and then another layer just like that and two more needles on the top. Five in all, which is a lot, but not enough to account for the activities of a regular user -- unless that user is reusing needles or maybe, just maybe, shooting up at work as well as at home.

If House is doing what Wilson thinks he is, this shouldn't take long. In his mind, Amber is standing there laughing while he twist-ties the top of the bag.

_It is a good one, isn't it?_ he thinks. _And it'll screw with Detective Boy, too, which has got to be a bonus.  
_  
He spends the rest of his evening sipping wine, watching _Mystery!_, and figuring out which drug he'll deny that he's abusing.

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House takes one look into the trash bag and finds he's too busy being thrilled, thrilled right to the core of his nonexistent soul, to bother telling Lucas he's an idiot.

_Using?_ Oh, no. Not Wilson, not _ever_ Wilson. That bastard has _trounced_ him, made up this whole damn thing. How absolutely _glorious_.

No one but Wilson can do this to him. No one but Wilson, his _friend_, would even try.


	3. Chapter 3

House arrives late on Friday morning, to find his new fellows waiting on him and his desk chair in two large pieces and four small ones. The seat has been removed from its base, and the four bolts are lined up neatly on the desk.

Taped to House's computer monitor are two blurry snapshots of the Scene of the Crime: Lucas, lying in an undignified tangle on the rug, looking shocked and then confused at the sudden collapse of the chair. House's oversized tennis ball sits a few feet from his side.

"So," House begins.

"I took the photos," says Kutner, jumping up with all the eagerness of a five-year-old who knows the answer, "but it wasn't me."

"Of course it wasn't," House agrees. "_That_ would have been done by someone I _can't_ fire." He's out his door and bursting through Wilson's in a matter of seconds.

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"You got the wrong guy," House gloats. He slaps the printed pictures atop whatever boring form Wilson's filling out.

Wilson barely glances at them. "I watched it happen," he says, turning his computer monitor so House can see the video feed from the camera hidden somewhere on House's shelves. "You really do think everything's about you, don't you?"

"Since it was my chair you rigged, that seems reasonable."

Wilson sets down his pen and looks up at him. "_You_," Wilson says, "are bright enough to inspect your chair before you sit. _He_ isn't."

"You mean ..." _Good God_. This thing has turned out better than House could have imagined. Not only did Wilson retaliate, he went for a _bonus round_. "You really _are_ my hero."

Folding his hands behind his head, Wilson leans back a little, smiling that softly evil smile. "He likes to pretend he's you. He should face some of the _hazards_ of that, don't you think?"

"He's an idiot." He really is, but Wilson bothered to prank him, and ... that might not be a good thing after all. "You don't ... _like _him?"

"He annoys me. Fire him, House."

"I will, as soon as I find him. Answer the question."

"He's my new best friend and we're already planning a road trip to L.A. What part of 'fire him' did you miss? C'mon," he says, getting up and switching off the incriminating video image on his monitor. "You're buying my lunch today."

House merely smiles, following him out the door. Sure, he'll buy. He'll even do it _cheerfully_, just to watch the suspicions and theories begin to grow like kudzu in Wilson's brain. House will encourage those wicked vines, fertilize them, and then ... he's not sure what then, but _something_.

He'll figure it out over lunch.

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~end~


End file.
